Arc 8: Extermination / chapter

Extermination 8.3: Fucking Timmy

Krixwell Jace3 Comments

Source material: Worm, Extermination 8.3

Originally blogged: November 29, 2017

Ah, yes, there we go. There’s no “Interlude 8 (Bonus) Act 2″ or any bullshit like that. *glances over at Homestuck’s “Act 6 Act 5 Act 1 x2 Combo”*

Hi, everyone! It’s time for some more Endbringer action.

I think this chapter ought to let us know for sure what Tattle’s state is after the events of Interlude 8. If she’s dead (or badly hurt), the armbands will say so, and there’s no way Taylor won’t have a thing or two to think and feel about that. There’s a good chance the chapter will open with the announcement from Taylor’s armband if this is the case.

Other than that, Taylor needs to figure out exactly what she can do to help out in this battle. Oh, and maybe she’ll finally notice that she’s been subconsciously pulling in bugs and placing them around herself.

So, if everyone’s ready (I’m not sure I am)… let’s go find out if my favorite Undersider is dead.

As tough or invincible as a given cape might be, most were still hemmed in by the restrictions and boundaries of physics.

Arguable, but go on.

Getting hit by something that weighed nearly nine tons sent men, women, boys and girls in costume flying, if it didn’t kill them outright.

Oof.

Leviathan’s echo added surprising quantities of water to the battlefield. Every step and movement he made, he filled the space he’d just left with water.

I don’t find it all that surprising. There are three main factors to how much water he leaves behind: how he moves, how fast he moves, and how big he is. As a huge and quick being, he’s gonna leave behind a lot of the stuff.

How much water did it take to displace something as big as he was? However much it was, he created something like three times that amount when he took a single step forward, when you accounted for the space his body moved through.

And given how quickly he can take steps forward…

A hard amount to eyeball, because it had the same momentum his movements had, and some of it crossed great distances as he lunged and clawed his way through the front line of capes.

This is kind of odd, though. If he creates water behind his movement and it moves as quickly as he does or faster in the same direction, won’t a lot of the water just hit him in the back? That said, I get how claws can get out of the way by swinging, leaving the water to act like he’s throwing it.

Sham down, CD-5. Acoustic deceased, CD-5. Harsh Mistress down, CD-5. Resolute deceased, CD-5. Woebegone down, CD-5…

I had to help, somehow.

No Tattletale yet, but I’m not quite convinced she won’t be coming up soon. Looks like we’re focusing on Taylor figuring out what she’s supposed to do first, though.

I pressed both buttons on the armband and spoke into it, “Direct me to the wounded I can help. I do not have mobility powers. I am not very strong. I do have basic first aid training.”

Ooh, good idea. Taking the same approach the Undersiders were going to, eh?

There was a pause, then a female voice, synthesized, just sharp enough to be heard over the noise of lasers, guns and rain, “Acknowledged.”

The response both relieved and terrified me. I’d halfway expected that to fail.

Nice. So will the map on the armband direct her now?

My armband beeped and flashed, and I saw a red dot on the map, along with an arrow at the edge of the square screen.

Yup.

As I moved my arm, the arrow adjusted to keep pointing the same way. It was directing me to near where Leviathan was.

Well, that’s scary.

Man, what if it’s directing her to Tattle?

(#dang it timmy)

Lashing out with tail and claws, he was advancing steadily through the ranks of defenders. The occasional strike from a strong hero or one of the ranged combatants slowed him, made him stumble, if it hit in the right spot or pushed him off balance.

Stumble, but not much more, huh?

I hesitated to get closer. I hated myself for doing it. I was here for a reason, to do something.

And you found something to do, but damn it’s a scary something.

Legend fired a salvo of lasers at Leviathan, and the beams turned at right angles to strike Leviathan in precise areas, knocking his feet from under him, slamming him down into the road, catching him under the chin.

Shooting lasers around corners is such a silly idea for a superpower. It’s also awesome and I love it.

Leviathan raised a hand, and a geyser of water rose to block more incoming lasers.

Hm… fair enough. The transparency of water will only get you so far.

Legend’s lasers simply turned at angles to circle around Leviathan, strike the Endbringer from behind. They left Leviathan so hot that his flesh glowed a yellow-orange around the areas they struck him.

Ooh! That’s the closest I’ve seen to Leviathan actually getting wounded so far.

I took the opportunity, found some measure of courage and hurried forward to my target.

There was a leg, half floating, weighed down on one end by a metal boot on the foot.

Um.

Someone in a leather costume lay on their back,

Oh, good, there’s someone attached to it.

barely conscious, bleeding from a gash that had opened them from the left hip to their right shoulder, a cloud of blood spilling out in the filthy water that came halfway up to our knees, an inky black color in the gloom.

Ouch. First aid or not, Taylor isn’t a miracle worker (unless the miracles involve bugs), so this could be difficult.

Icouldn’t (sic) help them, as much as it pained me to ignore them, move on. I had to trust that the armband would direct me to someone I could help.

Yeah, this ain’t gonna work. Sorry, pal.

(#dang it timmy #probably)

I found the person my armband was directing me to, some teenage boy with a metallic bird design to his costume, the helmet that covered the upper half of his face looked like a bird’s head, maybe an eagle. I knelt by him.

Hm. Probably has the power of flight, at the very least.

There was a crash as Leviathan whipped his tail toward Legend, a blade of water soaring through the air to strike the hero out of the air. The onslaught of lasers interrupted, Leviathan shifted from a crouch on one side of the road to being the midst of the defending heroes in one fluid motion, resuming the carnage in the span of a heartbeat.

Shit.

Fierceling deceased, CD-5. Adamant down, CD-5

I’m pretty sure this is the first time these bits haven’t ended with an ellipsis.

He was way too close to me for comfort – a single leap on his part would close the distance to me – but freaking out over it wouldn’t help anyone. I could only hope that the front line would hold for long enough for me to help this person.

Good luck.

(#dang it timmy)

“What can I do?” I asked the bird-costume.

“Leg,” he said, voice strained, “Help me stand.”

His left leg, I realized, was smashed into pulp from the knee down.

Ouch.

I crouched, helped him get his arm over my shoulders, and used my legs to heave both of us into a standing position. The bird-costume was below average in weight for a teenage guy, but it wasn’t exactly easy. He was wearing armor.

Historical armor is supposedly lighter than one would expect, but it’s certainly not weightless. Besides, this is probably not historical armor.

I might not have been able to get both of us up to a standing position like that if it weren’t for my weeks of running.

Hey, training is paying off!

He leaned on me heavily with each step forward, and we retreated from the front lines. Someone with the ability to fly landed not far from me to pick up the man with the gaping wound across his torso, flew off with him.

Good to know he’s at least being taken care of by someone.

Two seconds later, a teleporter blinked into existence near us, touching two fallen capes, and disappeared with them and a bathtub’s worth of water.

Beep beep, the hearseaporter’s here.

I wanted to apologize for not having a better power to help this person, but the breath would have been wasted. It was hard work to help him along, to slog through the water.

Maybe if Taylor had found someone with the power to make animals grow or shrink to team up with, she could control a swarm of giant bugs to pick up wounded or fallen capes.

The fight was ongoing, with a dozen heroes in Leviathan’s vicinity, more than twenty others shooting at him from range whenever there was a clear shot.

pew pew pew

Yet more were on the fringes, to keep him from slipping past the combatants and to take the place of the fallen.

Ah, yeah, there’s been a bit of an “only a few at a time” mentality going on here.

It wasn’t enough – the damage we were doing was negligible and his long strides were advancing him further and faster than the rest of us could back away through the water. Trash and debris threatened to trip us up with every step we took.

Water is notoriously slow to move through, especially when it’s getting above your knees.

He forced a fighting retreat, moving quickly and often enough to avoid being caught by any concentrated fire.

Coddamn speedsters…

Our progress was agonizing. Move too slowly, and we fell behind, move too fast as we waded through the trash-ridden water, and we risked falling, lost precious time.

And lives.

Had to find the middle ground, and we weren’t moving fast enough even if we did find that sweet spot. Hell, it would have been kinda difficult even without my burden.

Yeah, this is a pretty vulnerable situation.

Chubster down, CD-5. Good Neighbor deceased, CD-5. Hallow deceased, CD-5.

On some level, I feel like Wildbow is getting less serious with these cape names. 😛

Sham, Harsh Mistress (probably has gravity powers), Woebegone (healer?), Chubster, Good Neighbor…

It was Alexandria who speared forward to confront Leviathan. He saw her coming, ceased his onslaught to rear back and then lunge ahead to meet her. When they were only fifteen feet apart, he stopped, let his water echo rush forward to meet her.

I don’t fully get how he can do this. If the water appears in the space he vacates, then he’s in the way of it. You could argue that it appears in front of him due to rearing back as he stops, but that water should have backwards momentum, just like the parts of him that rear back, right?

(#dang it timmy)

Anyone else might have been staggered in the face of several tons of water moving forward at the speed of a locomotive. Alexandria intertwined her fingers, swung her arms forward as though she were holding a baseball bat, and cracked her hands against the image a second before she disappeared headlong into it.

Didn’t we see her do this in 8.2 or Interlude 8 as well?

There was a sound like a bomb going off, water spraying everywhere, followed by an earthshaking crash as Alexandria used the crook of her arm to catch Leviathan around the neck and heaved him backwards and onto the ground.

…damn

Let’s just say I understand why nine-year-old Taylor liked Alexandria so much.

She’s wrestling the mini-kaiju. That’s badass as fuck.

Most of the capes took the chance to retreat and expand the gap between themselves and the Endbringer, firing lasers or sonic blasts or whatever else at him as they retreated.

Nice work, Alexandria, giving people time to withdraw further.

It was so strange to think I was just like the rest of these people. Even after all this, the last few long weeks to get used to being in costume, it felt like I was the bystander.

To be fair, you’ve got a relatively weak power under these sorts of circumstances, but even if you didn’t, it’d probably take a while to get used to this thought.

Maybe it was that my power was ineffectual here, in the water and the rain, maybe everyone felt that way.

…I can’t think actually reasonable things without Taylor either ninjaing me or following right after, can I. 😛

A flier with fringes of ribbons down the sides of her arms, legs and body landed next to me, “Give him to me.”

Nice. Now you can go find someone else to help.

We transferred the bird-boy to her grip, and they were gone in an instant. My armband flashed and pointed me toward the next target.

The armband is really advanced. Dragon did a good job.

A series of explosions and a massive collision marked Dragon firing a full salvo of missiles and entering close quarters combat with Leviathan.

Speak of the devil!

Also, this sounds familiar too. It seems we’ve rewinded a bit again, seeing Dragon’s attack and seemingly self-destructive “suit”splosion again, from Taylor’s perspective.

In other words, Tattletale hasn’t happened yet and her fate is still up in the air.

Alexandria was gone – no, wait, she was rising from the water, where Leviathan had been holding her down. Standing, staggering, falling again. Had he been drowning her?

Not a pleasant experience.

Dragon began breathing out a stream of what might have been plasma in Leviathan’s face. From his increased struggles and frenetic clawing at her, I gathered he didn’t like it. Still, it was doing surprisingly little damage to him.

That seems to be the norm by now.

Leviathan found a point to get a solid grip on Dragon’s armor, and tore off a plate. His next swipe took off another, and it careened a good twenty feet before landing with a heavy splash, close enough to me that I was caught in the spray.

Yeah, here we go. I wonder if Taylor will figure out that Dragon isn’t in the suit like Tattle is about to, simply through her habit of thinking about things rather thouroughly.

Tattle certainly has an advantage, though.

I hurried to the next target on my armband. It was a woman witih a white costume, white hair and what was probably skull paint on her face. It was hard to tell, and not just because of the rain smudging the make-up. Nearly half her face was torn off.

…that’d do it, yes.

Glanced by one of Leviathan’s claws, maybe, or caught by the lash of water from his tail.

Either way, if she survives this, she’s gonna have a hard time avoiding getting a certain nickname from the Batman fans in her life.

“Hey,” I shook her gently by the shoulders, “You awake? You alert?”

Maybe a stupid question. I didn’t even know if she could talk with her face like that.

If she can’t, there might be other methods of communication available to her, like moving an arm.

A small wave sloshed against us, she sputtered and turned her head, didn’t respond. That was a ‘no’ to at least one of my questions. I suspected her condition was a combination of shock and blood loss as much as anything else.

Another thing that getting half your face torn off will do to you.

Too heavy for me to lift, and I didn’t have first aid supplies. Fuck, I could have kicked myself for that.

Ah, shit.

Anything I did have – epipens, smelling salts – were probably spoiled by the water and the septic conditions. Not that they would have helped.

True. It’s not like Leviathan is making venomous bugs sting people. That’s Taylor’s domain, buster.

I looked up, looked around. Spotted what I needed. Someone was manifesting green fireballs in his hands, lobbing them at Leviathan, where they exploded violently.

The color green immediately makes me think of Eidolon, and some of the fanart had him manifesting green orbs of some sort in his hands (well within his established power set, which is “pretty much anything”), though it seems odd for Taylor to describe him as “someone”.

I rose, hurried to him, keeping low so I didn’t walk face first into anyone’s laser blasts or gunfire. “Your fire, is it radioactive? Is it anything special, extra dangerous?”

I don’t know why Taylor considers this what she needs. She’s lost me on this one.

He gave me a look, lobbed another fireball, “It’s fire, it combusts if I concentrate it.”

“Okay. Great. I need your help.”

He nodded.

Is she trying to use his fire medically? Scorch off the other half of the woman’s face so she’s at least kinda symmetrical?

I showed him the woman. “Blood loss is a problem. She needs the wound cauterized.”

Ahh, I see… I knew there was some medical use for heat, but I couldn’t remember what it was.

His eyes widened, “I can’t do that! Her face-”

“-Is half scraped off. She’s not going to care about a burn.

Heh. Desperate times call for desperate measures, I guess.

There’s nothing close to a clean bandage anywhere here, and she’s going to die if we don’t stop the blood loss.”

Looking a little sick, he nodded, wreathed his hand in flame and then pressed it against the woman’s face. She pulled away, made a gurgling noise. I gripped her head and shoulder to keep her in position.

This is a somewhat odd medical procedure, but if it works, great!

“Come,” I said, after he pulled his hand away, “Help me move her.”

Greenfire – I wasn’t sure on his name, and it didn’t seem the time to ask –

Heh. Not a bad impromptu name, at least.

If I had to give him a more thought-through one, I might’ve gone with something involving “Jade”, but that’s probably just because I’ve been reading Miraculous Ladybug fanfics with a “Jade Turtle” recently.

I hooked one arm under her armpit, I used both hands under the other one, and we hauled her off to one side, into an alley, propped her up sitting.

“I’ll stay here,” Greenfire said, “Keep an eye on her. You go.”

Greenfire can probably do more against Leviathan, but there are a lot of people on that already.

I nodded, pressed both buttons on the armband and spoke, “Next!”

Hm… maybe last time, the armband recognized that the guy with the crushed leg was coming back to whatever sort of base has been set up to take care of the wounded.

As we emerged from the alley, there was a massive explosion,

“We”?

five times what had followed when Dragon launched her missiles at Leviathan. Leviathan reeled – He had a shallow burn along one side of his neck, more on his face, one of the four glowing orbs of eyes were dim, but it wasn’t as much damage as I might have suspected.

Is this when Dragon’s mech explodes, or is that what Taylor means by “what had followed when (…)”?

He lashed his tail violently, as if in anger, or maybe he intended to use the echo of his tail’s lashing to strike down others, I couldn’t be sure.

Could be both.

It was a contingent of lesser heroes that joined the fray, now. It was as though the tougher fighters were staggering their attacks, to ensure that just the right amount of force was being exerted to keep Leviathan on his heels, taking the maximum amount of damage while being prevented from taking out too many capes at once.

Hm… I guess that might work?

These three were clearly members of the same team, flying in formations, moving in sync. Two of them had super strength, and were gripping at the damaged areas of Leviathan’s flesh, tearing, pulling away as he lashed out in response, while the third had a massive battleaxe with what looked like a chainsaw setup on each blade, opening more wounds.

Oh hey, massive battleaxe guy. We’re getting closer.

And we’re actually doing some damage against Leviathan!

The damage was superficial, only taking off slices of Leviathan’s hide, but surely stripping away his hard exterior would help in the long run?

It may take about a thousand licks to get to the center of a lollipop, but we’ve got a lot of people doing the licking here.

The armband directed me to someone that was already getting assistance. An obese cape in armor, getting CPR from a man with a princess-bride style mask over the upper half of his head, a goatee, a chainmail lined mantle and a shotgun three times the normal size.

I can’t imagine that this latter cape wouldn’t look at least a little bit silly, at least outside deadly circumstances like these.

He didn’t know what he was doing – the fat man’s chin was almost touching his collarbone.

Ah, yeah, rookie mistake. It’s an opportunity for Taylor to help out, at least.

When I moved to take over, Shotgun Westley left without a word, wiping his mouth and unslinging his gun as he ran back to the fray. I was irritated.

Least he could do is hear if Taylor needed help.

Also, I’m liking Taylor’s nicknaming so far. 😛

Hew down, CD-5.

“Hew down, CD-5.”

“Who?”

“Yes, CD-5.”

“Yes down?”

“Hew down, CD-5.”

“Yes.”

I realize that the pronunciation of “Hew” might be “hyou” in this case, ruining the joke… But hey, it’s a text-based medium, who knows what kind of dialect the armbands speak.

(Newfoundlander, maybe?)

It was my first time giving CPR for real. So much harder than it was in the class, on so many levels. I don’t know if it was the fat man’s powers, his weight, his armor, or some combination of the three, but it took incredible effort to actually fill his lungs. Just doing it made me want to gag.

I’d imagine it gets a lot harder once you do it on someone with lungs that are bigger than your own.

He’d vomited a little at some point, and though I’d wiped it away as best as I could when I was done checking his mouth for blockages, the taste lingered. The taste of salt water only accented that flavor, sort of the same way table salt did with a cooked meal.

Ew.

Strapping Lad down, CD-5. Intrepid down, CD-5.

Strapping Lad? Sounds like someone’s thinking highly of himself. 😛

Intrepid sounds familiar, though I don’t know if it’d because they’ve been mentioned before or because that’s a reasonably common word in reference to heroes.

I was aware of Narwhal stepping into the fray, in my peripheral vision. She raised her hands, manifesting a dozen forcefields like oversize crystal shards around her, then flicked them forward. Like guillotine blades, the forcefields raced toward Leviathan, faster than the eye could follow, sunk into his flesh. Those that glanced off stopped mid-air to turn around, edges against his body, getting in the way of his legs moving.

Huh, interesting. I wasn’t expecting forcefields to be physical enough to “glance off”.

Although I suppose if they’re physical enough to cut people, that just makes sense. It’s just… I’m not used to forcefields obeying physics to any notable extent.

Also? Getting closer.

There was a horrendous crash, I looked up, pausing to catch my breath, saw the remains of a car falling apart around Leviathan.

And there’s Ballistic, right on cue.

Another crash, a piece of rubble turning to dust from the speed of the impact. I couldn’t see through the bodies, but I had an idea of who it was. Ballistic.

Yep.

A dumpster hit Leviathan in the upper body with the speed of a bullet, and he folded backward, his shoulders hitting the ground while his legs and feet were still held against the ground by a mess of razor blade forcefields.

Nice!

Narwhal sent another forcefield flying into his neck, and it cut as deep as any attack had yet. Blood spilled down from the opened wound, thick, more like ichor than anything I was used to seeing.

Because of course he can’t have human-like blood either. Though Tattle’s revelation that he was never human kind of makes the extremely unusual biology somewhat less… surprising. It does raise a question about the true origin of the Endbringers, though.

Let’s hope she gets the chance to actually tell someone about that.

I heaved another breath of air into the lungs of the fat man, he sputtered, coughed up a mouthful of dark water. I knew I was supposed to follow up on the CPR, but there was no way I could move or roll this guy.

Hm… I wonder if this is Chubster, and if his power actually involves his size.

Unable to do anything but wait and see if he recovered, I raised my head to watch the continuing battle, feeling just a touch dizzy.

The ranged attack continued. Miss Militia had a bazooka as long as she was tall, and was firing a series of warheads into Leviathan. She wasn’t reloading, either. Between shots, the weapon crackled with energy, fresh ammunition loaded into the chamber by her power. One projectile fired off each second.

Niice.

So her power is able to conjure up ammunition for her psychic weapon, whatever she chooses it to be, that probably isn’t also part of her psyche.

There was the girl with the crossbow, who had been with Shadow Stalker. She had a teammate next to her, handing her the needle-like bolts from a quiver, was loading them into the large crossbow and firing them as fast as she was able. More than any other attack, the bolts were stabbing deep into Leviathan.

Interesting… I wonder if his tough skin is porous. Maybe he’s like a really hard sponge up close.

The attacks were actually having an effect. He was on the defensive, now, and he was hurting.

We’re winning, I thought.

It could look like that, but I really don’t trust that “I thought” right there, or the fact that we’re less than two chapters into the fight.

A flash to my left caught my eye.

It was my armband. The screen was ringed by a square of yellow, a yellow triangle with a black exclamation mark pointing in Leviathan’s general direction.

Uh-oh. Is that the alert for the wave we saw from Tattle’s perspective?

People were shouting. Screaming, Narwhal was moving forcefields up in between us and Leviathan, other forcefields were going up.

Gotta stop the sploosh.

“To me!” someone near me shouted. I turned to look, saw Shielder from New Wave.

Tidal Wave.

Quick, get Shielded!

The fat man’s eyes weren’t even open, he moved too slowly as I shook him.

There was no helping it.

…welp. No CPR is gonna help this guy anymore.

I gave the fat man one backwards glance, and bolted for Shielder. I mouthed an apology I didn’t have the breath to utter, more for my conscience than for the man I hadn’t saved.

😦

Shielder waited until the last second to erect his cerulean bubble around himself. I caught a glimpse of one cape, a step too slow, getting trapped on the outside, a half second before the wave hit. Crushed against the exterior of the solid-light forcefield by the onrushing waters.

Ouch.

I’d been in an earthquake before. A three on the Richter scale, brief. I’d been at home, and a check of the house afterward only found a few books knocked off the shelf, a mirror fallen from the wall in the front hall. This was a hundred times more intense, the water rolling over us, against the nearby buildings, making the ground shudder.

A hundred times more intense makes it a five, theoretically.

For one brief moment, we were submerged, currents running past Shielder’s bubble. water in front of us, to either side, behind and above. Outside the translucent bubble, I saw a massive dark shape zip past us, saw Shielder fall to his knees, as though the force of the water against the bubble in Leviathan’s wake was nearly more than he could bear.

Oof, yeah, with the kind of momentum this water has…

Hang in there, buddy.

Heavy casualties, please wait, a chorus of identical voices announced, coming from the armbands of those ten or twelve of us in the bubble.

Damn, Leviathan basically just DDoSed the armbands with deaths.

Telling us that we’d just taken losses so heavy that the Dragon’s computer system couldn’t or wouldn’t list them all.

You just had to think “We’re winning”, Taylor…

(#dang it timmy)

The water surging around us stopped abruptly, evaporated into a mist in a second. Swirling, the mist began drifting.

Myrddin, working with Eidolon. They stood in the center of the road, Eidolon turning the water into mist, while Myrddin gathered it.

Ooh!

Myrddin’s wooden stick was held aloft, and the mist was forming a sphere the size of a beachball at one end.

So what’s the technical description of this power? Mist control? Something more general?

Ok, I could almost buy the wizard angle, seeing that.

Hehe.

Leviathan leaped from the roof of a nearby building, landing in the midst of one group that was still reeling from the wave, started tearing through them.

Aaand here we go again.

The armbands remained ominously silent, even as I watched the casualties.

Cod dammit. Did he really just set up a circumstance where the one thing I was certain about regarding Tattletale’s situation might not apply when we get there?

Well played, Wildbow. Well played.

Myrddin pointed his staff and launched that orb at Leviathan. It hit harder than anything yet, and the brute was sent flying into the interior of a nearby building.

I’m thinking Myrddin’s power might be generally gathering things up and then firing them out, not just with mist. Kind of similar to Ballistic, except Ballistic has to actually get to the thing he wants to send off, and Myrddin might be limited to non-solids where Ballistic is limited to solids.

“Seal him off!” someone shouted. Chevalier. “Make him come back our way!”

So hey, is this the building Tattle is on? Did Myrddin just send Leviathan in her direction?

Forcefields went up around the exterior of the building.

I don’t remember this happening in the Interlude, though, but it’s possible Tattle didn’t see it.

The building itself bulged and warped as Vista exerted her power, thickened the walls, made the middle floors of the building draw together slightly, a slight hourglass shape.

I never knew that building models were held to the same beauty standards as human ones.

I saw her, wet and worn out, one hand raised, shouting something I couldn’t make out at one of the out-of-town Wards. The Ward was speaking into his armband, replaying some message.

I’m guessing that should be “relaying”?

Whatcha got to say, then?

I’d like to note that I don’t recall Tattle’s armband saying anything at all in the Interlude. Maybe she forgot to turn it on? Or turned down the volume? Or maybe my memory is just shit.

Depart from the rooftops, buildings may come down imminently, my armband announced.

I feel like Tattle would definitely take note of this if she heard it while on the rooftop.

Flying capes left the roof of the building, each carrying someone. They were still leaving as Leviathan lunged through the side of the building and the forcefields that had been reinforcing the walls. He tried to retreat, was stalled by more forcefields. I saw a figure on the far side. Bastion. The hero who had been in the news over his racist tirade.

I don’t remember, were we given an idea of Bastion’s power back in 8.1?

*looks back* No, we didn’t. Maybe we’re about to?

[Discord]

LHC:
I just checked; it’s actually a really clever move on Wildbow’s part to avoid redundancy in Tattletale’s interlude, the armband talking is described
but it doesn’t actually quote it

Krixwell:
Ohh

LHC:
it doesn’t actually have lines of dialogue from the armband
but it says stuff like “the armband listed off casualties”

Oh yeah, that’s right… not only is it good for avoiding redundancy, but the italics formatting of the armband’s announcements could’ve caused confusion for some readers with the italicized representation of Tattle’s power (though that was also indented).

Bastion bellowed, “Do it!”

Leviathan lunged, crashed through one barrier, making it shatter like glass, only for another to appear immediately after. He turned to head our way, was stopped by another.

Nice.

“Fucking do it!” Bastion called out, barely audible.

Oh, that’s not what you wanted them to do.

What was it, then?

The building above him bent and the midsection, unable to support the upper floors, crumbled. The upper half of the building crashed down atop Leviathan and Bastion.

Oof.

Vista turned, wrapping her arms around the Ward next to her, burying her face in his shoulder.

This girl is twelve. And she’s fighting an Endbringer.

I hope the PRT has some good therapists on hand.

[I didn’t realize it at the time, but:]

(#dang it timmy)

“Move forward!” Armsmaster called out, “He’s going to want to escape to recover! We can not let him!”

The longer he’s trapped under that building, the better.

Leviathan had more than halved our ranks with the wave. I could see people face down in the water. Others were crumped up, their bodies contorted, broken, still.

Damn. And the next wave is apparently going to be even stronger?

And the damage to the city was just as bad, in a different way. I stared at the wreckage, the block and a half of shattered buildings, and saw a looming mess of arches and massive iron beams and girders, unable to comprehend what it was.

…I wonder how far in from the coast the Loft is/was. Or Danny’s house, for that matter.

It dawned on me. The PHQ. The headquarters of our local superteam, tourist attraction, torn from whatever fixtures had rooted it in place, smashed to ruins against our coastline.

…oh.

Welp. I guess that forcefield around it didn’t work out in the end.

Like with the Boardwalk, I feel like this warrants a #dang it timmy. Rest in peace, Protectorate Headquarters.

(#dang it timmy)

The Armband spoke. Losses are as follows: Debaser, Ascendant, Gallant, Zigzag, Prince of Blades, Vitiator, Humble, Halo, Whirlygig, Night, Crusader, Uglymug, Victor, Furrow, Barker, Elegance, Quark, Pelter, Snowflake, Ballistic, Mama Bear, Mister Eminent, Flashbang, Biter…

Oh shit, I was just thinking, between posts, about the armband DDoS and how Wildbow managed to make it so we might not find out Tattletale’s fate in this chapter after all, but here it is, listing up.

We might hear the name Tattletale on its own in a couple paragraphs.

Also, I see there are some names we know in here – Gallant, Night, Crusader, Victor, Ballistic and Flashbang… damn, Glory Girl’s not gonna like this. She just lost both her father and her boyfriend.

(Oh, and Halo. I choose to believe The Endbringer is such a huge threat that they called in backup from a different story‘s superhero organization. Sydney, may she rest in peace, clearly died from the sheer unspiciness of the water.)

The names kept coming. I almost wanted to cover my ears, but not knowing for sure was worse.

…Cloister, Narwhal, Vixen, The Dart, Geomancer, Oaf, Tattletale…

There it is.

Goodbye, Tattletale. You were always the best Undersider for me.

(#also Vixen is the name of a heroine from the Ladybug fanfic I finished reading this morning

#dang it timmy)

The recitation continued, but I was numb to them. Tattletale? I started, looked around, as if I could find her. Where had she been?

No, what I suddenly really wanted to know was what the armband meant by losses. Were all those people dead? Was Tattletale dead?

Confusion. Denial.

Why wasn’t the armband directing me to help someone? Was there no point, or were our numbers so reduced we couldn’t afford to?

I think Taylor just kinda wants something to focus on other than the fact that her armband just told her her best friend was dead.

I could hope it was the latter, but having seen some of the injuries I had, it didn’t make me feel better. It was almost worse, thinking that Tattletale might by (sic) lying somewhere, bleeding out or unable to breathe, not getting help.

I guess so.

“Be ready!” Armsmaster called out.

This makes me think of the very beginning of the battle.

Leviathan heaved himself up out of the building’s remains in one motion, used his tail to pick up and fling a mess of broken wood, concrete and rebar at us. Aegis threw himself into the cluster of projectiles, but two capes were struck down by smaller chunks. A third was folded in half by the arc of water from Leviathan’s tail.

It’s not looking good.

Brigandine deceased, CD-5. (sic)

At least the two capes that were struck down are still alive.

[I think the “(sic)” here was for the lack of italics.]

I couldn’t afford to dwell on what might have happened to Tattletale. I wiped beads of water from the lenses of my mask with my gloved hands, pushed my hair out of my face, and made a note of my bugs.

I think that’s the first time she’s even thought of the bugs in this battle, at least that we’ve seen.

There were scant few in the way of bugs that could navigate in this storm. Myrddin had banished the water from the wave, somehow, but the downpour was making the streets flood fast enough that I didn’t trust anything to crawl. No, my power was dead useless, here.

Basically, the only reason you’re here is because you want to help, not because you’re actually any more qualified to than a fit mundane with first aid training. Though to be fair, you didn’t know the Endbringer in question would be the watery one.

Hm. I wonder if Behemoth and the Simurgh have similar elemental affiliations. If they do, it’s almost certainly air for the Simurgh and fire or earth for Behemoth.

Leviathan turned around, lashing his tail behind him to cast three lashes of water our way, then crouched.

Uh oh. Last time that I can recall he crouched, he was getting ready for a leap that caused the first deaths.

“He’s running!” someone called out.

Leviathan dashed away from us, fast, only to skid to a stop and turn a corner for cover as Legend, Lady Photon, Laserdream and a half dozen other heroes opened fire from the skies above.

On the face of it, Leviathan withdrawing seems like a good thing, but it doesn’t actually do any good unless they can get him to withdraw completely, going far enough away that he can’t continue attacking the city with waves or trying to create the sinkhole under the city.

Others had picked themselves up, were moving into the side streets and alleys to follow, intent on cutting him off. I looked around, glancing over at the injured and wounded, knowing Tattletale was among them.

Y’know, I do think Taylor’s reaction to hearing Tattle’s name has been a bit less intense than expected (though admittedly, she’s not exactly a dramatic person). That’s probably because she’s holding on to the doubt in the armband’s definition of “losses”… which means she might actually be about to find Tattletale. It might take actually seeing the body to get the real reaction out of her.

Eidolon was staying behind, raising his hands, and green sparks began rising from the ground, clustering around Eidolon and the fallen, obscuring them.

Hm, now what kind of power is this? Some sort of mass teleport?

A second later, he and half of the bodies that had been scattered around the battlefield disappeared, the sparks blooming outward in twenty small firework explosions.

A showy one. It’s certainly not something you do unnoticed under calmer conditions.

I took that as my cue to join everyone else in the pursuit. Eidolon could help the wounded. I couldn’t, really.

Should’ve brought that first aid equipment.

I ran after the others, nearly tripping into a pothole in my hurry. My armband showed a green icon for Leviathan, and I followed it.

Rounding a corner, I came up at the rear of a small crowd, perilously close to the Endbringer.

Woah, watch out!

Fog was blocking one route, while Sundancer stood at another, her superheated orb between her and Leviathan.

Oooh, I’m sure he wouldn’t like to touch that. Besides, the scorching heat could help get rid of some of the water, especially if Myrddin is involved.

The remaining capes were divided between the other two possible alleys Leviathan might have moved through and the air above him. Legend was hammering Leviathan down to the pavement with a series of laser blasts.

They’ve got him surrounded, it sounds like. Niiice.

“Care!” Miss Militia cried out, “Fire in the hole!”

She fired a shot from her grenade launcher, grabbed another grenade with a blinking LED from her vest and loaded it into her gun. Why? She’d shown with the bazooka that she didn’t need to load ammunition, hadn’t she?

Hm. I actually thought of explosive ammo back when she did that, as a reason why she shouldn’t be using her psyche for ammo, but… bazookas use explosive ammo too, don’t they? I don’t think that’s why she’s suddenly reloading.

It’s much more likely that these aren’t regular grenades that can be produced by her power, but rather some sort of Tinkertech. The kind of explosives you’d expect from Bakuda, though perhaps not quite as advanced (depending on the Tinker’s specialty).

Then I realized why. It wasn’t the kind of ammunition you found in normal guns.

eyyy

The first shot exploded into a mess of golden sticky ribbon, familiar, though it somehow escaped my memory where I’d seen it.

That… does sound familiar to me too.

The second exploded in midair, near Leviathan’s shoulder, leaving the tips of the scales and one gaping wound glinting like crystal. As Leviathan moved to recoil, the edges of the crystal separated from his flesh and seeped with that dark ichor.

Nice hit!

(#every so often i do get something right

#even if i’m only one paragraph ahead of Taylor)

It’s possible that it isn’t merely like Bakudatech. It could’ve been confiscated from her on her defeat. Although with how crazy Bakuda is, it would be rather risky of the Protectorate to use her stuff.

The third was a modified explosive I recognized. It bounced off the ground between Leviathan’s foot and the hand he had planted on the ground, landed a ways behind and to the side of him, and exploded much like any other grenade might. What I recognized was the shimmer in the air around it, a near perfect sphere encompassing the surrounding area, catching Leviathan’s leg, the end of his tail, part of his waist and stomach.

Whoop, gotcha!

The explosion made Leviathan rear back, and the water that followed in his wake moved slower in that bubble, slowed down with each passing second.

Okay, yeah, this is definitely Bakuda’s tech.

The time slowing bubble would’ve really gotten him stuck if he hadn’t reared back. It’s hard to get your body parts out of a space that experiences time at a crawl.

Leviathan himself wasn’t as affected, and he had one foot and an upper body outside of the bubble to help him pull himself free.

…except apparently he’s partially resistant to he warping of spacetime itself?? Or is that just because he’s a speedster?

He raised his leg free of the golden string goop and up out of the sphere, lashed his tail toward the crowd I was at the back of, catching three people, entwining the tip around their arms, legs and necks.

Uh oh.

He flicked them into the center of the time distortion bubble, where they got caught, unable to make their exit fast enough to avoid being frozen in time.

Well… shit.

There goes that cleverness they weren’t supposed to underestimate.

(#dang it timmy #?)

Jotun deceased, CD-6. Dauntless deceased, CD-6. Alabaster deceased, CD-6.

Well, there goes our favorite Greek-themed hero, among others.

Wait. Why is it CD-6 now? I don’t really know what CD-5 meant to begin with, but something’s changed here all of a sudden. Is it the location on the grid, maybe? We did move.

He lashed his tail, sending out a scythelike blade of water toward the other group, turned and leaped.

Miss Militia down, CD-6.

Well, that didn’t exactly go the way she wanted.

Fenja and Menja moved to attack him, each tall enough to be at his shoulder level, but Leviathan was quicker. He darted backward, gripped the side of a building, and turned to run up the wall.

Like a true kaiju. Gotta get that King Kong in there, y’know.

He used his tail to radically adjust the angle of his ascent, hooking it on an open window and swinging himself forward over the edge of the roof, before anyone on the ground could get a bead on him. Debris fell where his tail had pulled through a section of the wall.

He’s getting away… not good.

Though he’d disappeared from my line of sight, I saw his afterimage continue rising. Shielder, floating in the air with the help of his sister, used a forcefield to stop the pair of them from being pulverized.

Nice.

The shield flickered out of existence a fraction of a second later. His reserves were exhausted, after helping save me and others from the last wave. He wasn’t strong enough to take a hit from Leviathan or his afterimage.

…not nice.

Legend fired a barrage of lasers at Leviathan, but the Endbringer was quick to hop to one side, landing on the roof’s edge. He made a sudden, standing leap a good eighty or a hundred feet into the air, tail extending to reach for the airborne heroes.

I guess getting away wasn’t his goal after all.

Oh, and not only will he possibly be able to reach one or two of the flying heroes, but any movement above the rest of the heroes will result in a water echo that can come crashing down on them a moment later.

The whiplike tail struck Legend, and there was a firework display of light and sparks, Legend tumbling out of the sky, head over heels. In the same movement, the tail reached for Laserdream and Shielder.

Legend down, CD-6, The armbands announced, just in time to coincide with Legend hitting the ground.

Oof.

Laserdream put her own shield up, and I could remember how Photon Mom, Laserdream and Shielder all had the same basic powers.

Oh, so she’s not entirely without shields, nor is Shielder entirely without lasers. They’re each just better on one than the other.

The difference between them was that while Photon Mom’s powers were well rounded, Shielder had a far, far, better forcefield, almost no flight ability and weak laser blasts. Laserdream was the opposite… her lasers and flight were good enough, but her forcefield, not so much.

It’s a pretty good setup.

Incidentally, I really like that Taylor is referring to Photon Mom by that nickname.

Leviathan wrapped his tail around the spherical forcefield that surrounded the siblings, bringing it and the pair down toward the roof as he fell. When they were halfway down, the constriction of the tail broke through the forcefield, snaked around Shielder’s body and Laserdream’s arm.

Welp.

The Endbringer landed on the roof with a shuddering impact and a showering of detritus, crashing through the roof. He bounded up to the edge of the roof, lunged off it.

It’s generally a good idea to land in a spot that can sustain your landing. Not that it seems to have slowed Leviathan down by any significant amount.

I could see it like it was slow motion. Laserdream’s hand glowed and she fired, using the concussive force of her laser to get her trapped hand free, flew up and back out of the way as Leviathan continued to fall.

…but we’ve just established that Shielder isn’t as good at either of the things his sister is using to survive. I don’t feel good about his survival chances.

Shielder, still in Leviathan’s grip, had his upper body brought down against the ragged edge of the building in passing.

Shielder deceased, CD-6

Yeah.

(#dang it timmy)

Laserdream’s ragged scream was like something distant, something I was barely aware of, because Leviathan was landing back in the area where the two alleys met.

I’m sorry. 😦

He leaped in Sundancer’s direction, caught the ground with the claws of his hands and feet to halt his momentum. His echo surged forward, some striking the superheated orb, where it blossomed into massive clouds of steam.

It’s fire versus water… what’s going to prevail here?

The rest went low, catching Sundancer below the waist, sweeping her legs out from under her in one violent rush. She flipped forward, her upper body colliding with the ground. The miniature sun winked out of existence.

Well, there goes that chance of getting more of a look into the Travelers’ issues via Sundancer…

Sundancer down, CD-6.

…wait, she isn’t dead! (Sunny surprise!)

Turning on the spot, Leviathan moved his claw, creating a wave with all of the water he’d generated since entering the alley, driving it into one of the two gathered groups.

Uh oh.

As those capes stumbled and fell back, Leviathan leaped over the time distortion bubble, landing at the front of the other group. The group with some of the local wards (sic), Velocity, some of Empire Eighty-Eight, and out-of-town capes I couldn’t name.

Landing from a parabolic arc means a spray of water echo over top of him, right?

The group I was at the rear of.

Shit.

Someone stepped up to grab him mid-lunge – some woman I didn’t recognize, who Othala was touching. She was granting this woman some form of invincibility that let her take a hit and not get knocked away by Leviathan.

Ooh, that’s a cool power.

Invincible though she might be, she couldn’t do anything to stop the afterimage from crashing against and around her, through our assembled ranks.

A lot of people are about to get wet.

I was shoved back – not by the water itself, but the tide of bodies that were struck, crushed and thrown by the afterimage.

Dominos!

…I don’t know, I’m just trying to find some kind of brightness in here.

As I was pushed backward, hard, I was spun by an impact at my shoulder. My arm slammed against a windowsill, and it exploded with a sharp, jarring pain.

Ouch!

I landed on my back, saw someone else get sent head over heels over the crowd, colliding against the wall with an audible cracking sound, landing limp as a rag doll, a matter of feet from me. He had a trumpet and a flag on his chest.

That, uh, doesn’t sound very promising for Trumpetflag.

Escutcheon deceased, CD-6. Herald deceased, CD-6.

Trumpetflag wasn’t good enough for you, eh, Herald?

I’m honestly surprised that attack only killed two people.

(#dang it timmy)

Kaiser – I hadn’t even seen him in the group – erected a latticework of blades across the front of the alley, between us and Leviathan. It wasn’t enough.

It was a nice try, at least.

Leviathan tore through them like I might tear through a wicker basket. Edged pieces of steel spun through the air and clattered to the ground.

Unfortunately, “nice try” isn’t enough against this overpowered motherfucker.

Kaiser changed tactics, creating columns of steel instead, each three or four feet across, harder to shatter. They were slower to emerge, but they bent rather than broke.

Nice! Essentially huge prison bars… at least it sounds like they’ll be a bit sturdier.

Leviathan responded by pushing. He exerted his full strength on the barrier of blades and the columns, leaning against them. The walls broke around the base of the columns, and the pieces of steel fell.

Dammit.

A stab of pain from my arm reminded me I was hurt. Fuck, it hurt a lot. It throbbed, and each throb seemed to be worse than the last. I felt shaky as I used my good arm to stand.

Leviathan didn’t make noise. I kept expecting a roar, or hiss, or something, but Leviathan was dead silent. I somehow imagined a victorious howl as he broke through the barrier, crouched, and lunged into the crowd.

Ah, yeah… I guess that’s what happens when he doesn’t have a mouth.

He stopped, and I thought he was using his afterimage, halting so it could rush forward, but even the watery echo stopped a second after it appeared, only the very edges of it continuing forward to crash violently against the sides of the alley.

Huh.

For several long heartbeats, it was nearly quiet, but for the sound of rain, people’s noises of pain, mine included, and the sound of one of Kaiser’s iron columns ripping free of the wall and falling atop a pile of blades.

So, uh. You good there, Leviathan?

How’s your day?

Want some, uh, tea?

It took me a second to realize what had happened. Leviathan hung frozen mid-pounce, and his emerging afterimage similarly stood there, frozen in time.

Oh shit, did he forget about the time bubble? Or does someone in the crowd have a time– CLOCKBLOCKER

Clockblocker, you beautiful bastard! Good job!

In the midst of the afterimage was Clockblocker, half-immersed in water.

…well, that’s probably not the best place to be once the effect of this wears off. I think this might count as a heroic sacrifice.

Just, one with a delay.

“Someone get him out of there! He’s going to suffocate!” I shouted, my voice made that much more edgier and strained by the pain I was in. My voice, though, coincided with no less than five other cries, all rising to be heard over everyone else.

Sounds like people are unanimous on this.

But if Clockblocker’s frozen the water around himself in time along with Leviathan, there’s no known way to get him out, is there? Much like with the bugs in Agitation, he’s trapped.

Trap Leviathan, contain him, use more of those grenades to get him before he got free.

Okay, so not unanimous. Never mind that part.

But yeah, if they can find a more permanent method of containment before he unfreezes, that would be really good.

Someone was even shooting arcs of lighting at Leviathan’s frozen form. Too many commands from too many people who hadn’t fought with or against Clockblocker, who didn’t know how his power worked, who had conflicting ideas on what we had to do.

Yeah, that’s an issue too – lots of these people don’t know Clocky’s power.

This chaos would fuck us over, keep us from accomplishing anything before Leviathan got free. We needed order, and most of the people who could have given it to us were out of action or nowhere nearby.

…Taylor, you were looking for a way to help, right?

Damn, if we’re actually resolving this by way of Taylor taking charge of the situation, that’s pretty close to something I considered jokingly suggesting a couple chapters ago: That Taylor would find herself organizing the efforts.

(That would’ve been an extension of the MLP:FiM reference I made back in 8.2 – I was comparing Taylor trying to figure out how she could help against Leviathan to Twilight Sparkle trying to figure out how she could help wrap up winter without magic, and Twilight ended up organizing the project.)

The armbands. Armsmaster had said it prioritized orders based on need.

There’s been surprisingly little use of the broadcast feature, honestly.

My left arm hung by my side, and I couldn’t even bring myself to raise it. Just gravity and the weight of my hand pulling down on it was excruciating. The idea of pressing the buttons was too much.

Hmm.

I reached for the person next to me, grabbed her wrist. Some woman with a crescent moon on a blue costume. She gave me a startled look with a lost, shellshocked expression. When I first pressed against the communications button, she moved her arm, as if she thought I was guiding her movements.

Should probably have said something first.

For now I’m calling this woman Princess Luna.

“Stay still!” I snarled at her. When I pressed again, depressing the two buttons with my pinky finger and thumb, she held her arm firm.

I shouted into the armband, “Clockblocker down, CD-6! Need a teleporter to get him free, stat!”

Ooh, a teleporter, good call. The water won’t be in the way if he doesn’t have to be classically moved through the space it’s in!

The time freezing effect of Clockblocker’s power lasted anywhere from thirty seconds to ten minutes. How long had we spent, here, since Clockblocker had given us this momentary reprieve? It was hard to judge the passage of time with the adrenaline, the frenetic pace of the ongoing battle.

In my case, it’s hard to judge the passage of time in general, but that’s my ADD.

Trickster appeared in the place of the blue moon Woman, tipped his hat at me.

Perfect! Now we just need something to put in Clockblocker’s place.

Also, Luna must be so confused. One moment, Taylor’s borrowing her communicator, and suddenly she’s somewhere else…

“Clockblocker, in there,” I pointed with my good hand.

Trickster frowned, looked around.

“I apologize for desecrating your body, brave hero,” he spoke, looking down at where the cape with the trumpet icon on his chest had flopped, dead. “You do good work even in death.”

I don’t know why it didn’t occur to me that there are lots of non-living objects the size and mass of a human body lying around.

Was he mentally cracked? Was he serious or was he playing around? I suspected the latter, but kidding around and wasting time in a situation like this?

Does Taylor not remember how Trickster’s power works?

In a second, the cape was replaced by an unconscious Clockblocker.

Hey there!

This makes me wonder what it takes for the armbands to count someone as “down”.

The pane of his helmet was cracked and leaking a trail of blood. I bent down to examine him, was pushed out of the way by someone else. Some woman with a costume that outlined her bones, like a really good version of the skeleton costumes you saw on Halloween.

Mrs. Skeltal requires doots.

She began using her fingers to check Clockblocker’s neck, and I couldn’t help but suspect she was a doctor.

Yeah, that or someone close to Clocky. Or both.

“Listen!” the voice that cut through the shouts and the frantic chatter was authoritative, strong.

Ooh, now who’s this? Kaiser, maybe? Although I’d imagine Taylor would recognize his voice.

Armsmaster.

Ah. I should’ve read another line before pointing out the recognition thing, because this is where it would go if it were Kaiser too.

He had Myrddin, Eidolon and Chevalier just behind him. People turned to listen, myself included.

A timeout like this is probably a rare occurrence in an Endbringer battle. Better use it for what it’s worth, especially since we don’t know how long it’ll last.

“He’s torn through our front line, he’s taken down some of our best, and he’s deliberately targeted and eliminated most of the capes who were in Bastion’s group.

The heavy hitters, right?

We have precious few left who can take a hit from this creature and survive it,

Oh right, the heavy hittables.

and we’re running low on those who can wall off another tidal wave or block his path.

The last one was bad enough with walling.

“We’re not going to be able to go on with Plan A.” The words hung in the air.

So what is Plan B?

“This brute is hurt, but we don’t have the resources to hold him down while we hurt him any more. We’re too tightly packed, like this, and it’s too easy for him to take us down in droves. Two or three more minutes of this, and there won’t be any of us left.”

So spread out?

Armsmaster turned, looked up at where Leviathan stood, frozen. He pointed up at the Endbringer with his Halberd. “We spread out. The second this beast is free, he’s going to look for a way out, to run and heal up what we’ve done to him. So we cut him off, we slow him down and keep him from getting to any areas where he can do real damage.

Sounds like a decent tactic.

“Eidolon is going to leave, do what he can to minimize the damage from the waves and ensure the rest of the city doesn’t get leveled while we’re fighting here. The rest of us are going to slow Leviathan down best we can, take any opportunities we can to hurt the motherfucker. In just a second, we’re going to organize you guys, put the toughest and strongest closest to this bastard, space out the people who can hurt him, get the weakest ones positioned to pass on word if they see him slip past us.

Let’s hope you have time for all that.

“This is our plan B. We stall, from here on out we prioritize survival over putting this abomination down, and we fucking pray that Scion notices there’s an Endbringer around and shows up before this city and everyone in it is a memory.”

Well. Not the most hopeful of plans, but since when was this a hopeful situation?

Endbringer of Extermination 8.3

This was a good chapter, but damn was it bleak.

More than 42 people died in this chapter, and that’s only the ones whose announcements we got to hear. That includes Tattletale, one of my favorite characters, though I was prepared for that due to the overlap between Interlude 8 and this chapter.

I’m not gonna lie: This is not my idea of a good time. I know this is one of the Arcs where people decide if Worm is for them, and if the story as a whole continues being this kind of bleak without lighter points in between, it’s eventually going to start leaning more towards a no. That said, I’m not going to end the liveblog as long as I’m still invested enough to want to continue, which I still am.

(Don’t tell me if it gets brighter or stays this bleak. That’s a thing I’ll just have to see for myself.)

So. The plan is no longer to win, but to survive until Scion – who apparently never stopped saving the world for a moment to buy a damn phone – shows up. I guess we’ll see in the next chapter how that works out for the capes protecting Brockton Bay.

See you then.

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